After only 8 weeks of “trying” we got the news we had expected to wait months for.

We were “expecting”!

Although we didn’t have time to really work ourselves up for this moment, nor, apparently, did we not do the required reading about “trying to conceive”, we were pretty excited.

I did what I always did, focussed on the task at hand and set about obtaining the most amount of information I could. I was going to be the best mother in the world. I would do it all right.

Off to the bookshop we went, and chose three of the best-sellers, which I set about reading from cover to cover. We booked ourselves into the tour of the hospital, then the antenatal classes. Then all the supplementary classes – breastfeeding, pain free labour and the rest. Everything I could get my hands on, we did.

I had the most envious of all pregnancies; no morning sickness, no sore boobs, no pains, no nothing. You couldn’t even tell I was pregnant, if I wore a loose fitting shirt, till I was 8 months. I had, quite possible, the most complication free pregnancy. All my checkups with the obstetrician were over in 3 minutes, after sitting in his waiting room for 2 hours or more. Nothing to report. All going well.

My due date came and went. I was scheduled to be induced, but my obstetrician decided I was sitting too high, so rescheduled me for 5 days time. I had a couple of contractions during the week – irregular, painful, but not that bad.

24 hours before I was due to go in for my induction, the contractions started proper. Overnight they got closer and closer. Painful, but I couldn’t help but think to myself “what are these women complaining about, the don’t hurt that much”, I could deal with the pain. Easily.

We drove through the peak hour traffic, and my husband dropped me off at the emergency department whilst he parked the car. I was shown to a birthing room, met the midwife, and my obstetrician was called. But my contractions, rather than getting closer together, were getting further apart! An hour in and they were 20 minutes apart, very unlike the 3 minutes I’d endured only 3 hours earlier.

My obstetrician arrived, commenced the internal exam to check my dilatation, and looked at me with a mildly worried expression on his face. “I think the baby has turned” he informed me, and went off to look for a ultrasound machine.

Nope. All was fine. Baby was right way up, and I was 3 centimetres dilated and progressing nicely. We commenced the induction as had been planned, minus the gel on the cervix component, and I was hooked up to a monitor (for the baby) and an IV drip, for the Syntocinon. Then, I was connected to the epidural, oxygen, some other machine and, finally, an internal monitor – one that attaches to the babies head to monitor its progress.

I had been given a time limit to “get this baby out” and if not by then, then it was upstairs to surgery.

But that would never happen to me. I didn’t believe in c-sections. They were for people who were lazy, maybe those who were unfit (definitely not me) or had some exotic medical condition. They weren’t for people like me.

So I settled back, as best I could attached to so much technology, prepared to do the work required.

Within half an hour, I was told that the limit I’d previously been offered was being reneged, and I was heading up to surgery there and then. I had everything explained to me, that the baby was nearing distress, that they weren’t prepared to wait any longer and off they took me.

My epidural was topped up, and I was given some foul tasting liquid to drink, and some other drugs. By this stage, my mind was elsewhere, and the medication only served to make me feel nauseous. I weaved in and out of a sleep like state.

The baby was removed and I heard his cry. He was brought to me, already wrapped, although I was unable to hold him. His poor little head was swollen and “cone” like, from tryinig to get through a too small pelvis. It was later I found out that the “bottom” my obstetrician had thought he felt in the exam earlier that day, was, in fact, swelling on the babies head.

My baby was then taken … somewhere. I was relocated to the recovery area, where I spent two hours. Recovering while the epidural wore itself off.

I was left alone for two hours to recall all those things I’d read in books, that had been repeated and repeated in each of our antenatal classes. That is “important to get the baby on your breast straight away” for the purpose of bonding, and to ensure “no feeding problems”.

I was left alone with my thoughts … “I’m never going to be able to feed him. I’ll never bond with him” such was the power of testimonial of the “experts”.

I eventually got to see my two hour old son, but was unable to sit up. I was shown how to feed him lying down, and he attached with no problem at all, feeding well for a good hour. And was taken to the nursery while I attempted some sleep. Not an easy thing to accomplish when having my blood pressure and temperature monitored every half hour.

So little trouble I was having with feeding and managing him, and sitting, standing and moving around, despite my fresh wound, I was given the opportunity to go home only after three days.

I chose not to take this offer up.

There was no way I could take this baby home. I didn’t know what I was doing. Besides, I wasn’t his mother – because I hadn’t “given birth” to him, so how could I lay claim to that title.

Obviously, I had to come home. I struggled with the concept that I was “really” a mother. And when I confronted that one, I then contemplated how I could even be responsible for this little person, when I wasn’t even capable of finishing the job that I had started. I was so incompetent that I needed intervention. How could I do the right thing?

My friends had all done it “properly”. I was accused of being lazy for not birthing naturally, that I had taken the “easy way out”. I was aware of the looks, or the backpeddling in conversations when I mentioned I’d had a caesarean – always careful to emphasise the “emergency” aspect of it. I was told it was my “fault”.

I latched onto newspaper articles and news reports on c-sections, willing there to be something ok with it. That I was ok. They only served to confirm that I had done the wrong thing; that I had exposed “this” baby to some dangers, that he would have psychological problems, that he would be at increased risk of asthma and lung problems, that he would have a lower IQ than his naturally born cohorts.

For 10 months I took whatever child rearing and parenting information I could get. First mother’s group, books and more books, asking maternal and child health nurse friends question upon question. I had to do it right, now. Not to look like a good mother, but to make sure that everything was done right by this child. That everything was done perfectly.

Because he had to be perfect when his “real” mother came back to get him. His real mother wasn’t me, it can’t have been, and one day his real mother, his real parents, were going to take him. I just didn’t know when that would be, and how long I had to make him the perfect child.

I was placed on medication for depression and sent to a psychologist. I worked through this for many months. I came of the meds after only a few months, pregnant with number two, who miscarried. Was this a good thing?

Not long after, I fell pregnant again. This pregnancy was not quite as easy as the first, but not difficult by any standards. My obstetrician refused to discuss birthing options until closer to the due date – which I was grateful for – until, at 30 weeks we discovered that my “little” bundle of joy was already in the 90th percentile. That is, almost the size of a full term baby.

A vaginal birth was never an option for me. I have cephalo-pelvic disproportion, or CPD – which pretty much means that I don’t have childbearing hips. My pelvis is too small for even a very small baby to fit through. So small, that my average sized first baby had massive swelling on his head from the labour, both natural and induced, we had both endured. A second caesarean was always on the cards.

I fluctuated between “nah, it’ll be fine, I’ll give labour a go and see how it turns out” and “thank goodness I’m not required to go through that again”. At neither birth did I have any doubt that what happened was necessary. I’d had the most amazing obstetrician who kept me informed always. There was nothing left to question.

I now have the most amazing, and beautiful boys. I love them with all my heart. I had no issues with feeding. I have overcome the bonding issue with my first. For all the “damage” I was doing to my children by them not being delivered “naturally” – well, they are both perfectly healthy, they have no cardio-pulmonary or respiratory problems, and they are most definitely very intelligent.

If they end up with any psychological issues – I’m quite convinced it’s not due to the way they were born.

Author – Anon

I lost my father at the age of 3 and my innocence was stolen by the age of 10. By 16 I was working in star-studded nightclubs in Sydney. In my 20’s I got married, had children, renovated a house and got involved with a fundamental church. For most of my 30’s I battled depression.

After thousands of dollars, multitudes of medications and years in traditional therapies I finally got fed up. I was sick of constantly feeling like I was a victim. I was sick of my therapists asking me to go back to the events of my past and tell them how I felt about it all over again. I was sick of blaming my mother for all the crap that I had invited into my life. I was finally ready to let it go …

 But to let it go, you have to know where it all started.

 My parents were immigrants. My mother migrated from Holland when she was 7 and my father from Fiji when he was a young adult. When my parents met my mother was 19 and especially taken by his charm and sophistication.

They married quickly and it didn’t take long for my mother to realise that he wasn’t the man she thought he was. In fact he was violent, an alcoholic, a drug user that put his family in danger. At times his neglect would mean there would be no food for days. My younger brother and I were a product of that relationship.

When I was 3 my father died. Or at least, that’s what my brother and I were told. A few years passed and my mother met the man who would become our loving step father for life. It was always evident that we were different as my mother was Dutch and my step father Australian. My brother and I were half Indian, so we looked like we didn’t belong to either of them. This was even more evident when my mother and father had children of their own. I remember that my brother and I would call ourselves ‘chocolate bars’ and the other two siblings ‘milky ways’. We were all very close.

When I turned I3 I began to ask questions about my biological Indian family. I was curious as to why my aunts, uncles, grandparents etc were not a part of my life. It didn’t make sense. My mother realised at that time that she had to tell us the truth. I will never forget that moment. Seeing and hearing the pain in her heart as she told us both about the traumas that she had endured.

Coming from a strict Roman Catholic family, it was frowned upon to divorce, (regardless of the circumstances). It was strongly suggested by my mother’s mother, to tell people that he had died. And that’s what everyone was told; including my brother and I.

I had a normal response for a 13 year old. Once the shock of the truth had worn off, I realised that I had a father and an entire Indian family who had not seen me in 10 years. Didn’t they love me? Why wouldn’t they come to see me? I later learned that my mother felt the need to keep us away as she feared being found by my father. I didn’t really understand that until I was an adult. All I felt at the time was abandonment, loss and anger.

The confusing thing for me at this time was all of a sudden I went from believing my father was a kind man who had been unfairly taken from us in a car accident, to discovering he was a violent, drunken, wife abuser. It confused me profoundly and created a mixture of pain and desperation.

To add pain to injury, my mother fervently stressed that as far as anyone was concerned, he was dead and we were never to say anything to anyone about it again. What she didn’t realise at the time was that my beliefs about myself changed. I started to believe that if my own father couldn’t love me how could anyone else.

Combining this belief with my innocence that was tampered with when I was as young as 10, I delved into sexual activity in my early teens. I had such low self esteem and self belief that I was not aware that certain sexual attention from men who were much older then me was inappropriate. Thus my sexuality was imprinted as being something that would be ‘taken’ – not shared.

At 16 I decided to leave home and moved far away to Sydney. I began working in nightclubs. The ‘who’s who’ of the celebrity world would frequent my workplace.

I have always been blessed with attractive looks and in my youth, I used this to my advantage. I became quite popular through my celebrity associations. I entered into a world where excessive behaviours and self gratification were the menu of the day.

I made a lot of money back then and lived a luxurious lifestyle. But, I was lonely. I was always lonely. I would cover my loneliness by making sure I always had the company of someone – even if it was the company of a stranger.

I was a great people gatherer. I would have parties, organise events or just collect people around me. Looking back, it was as though I was trying to create my own tribe; a community for myself.

I remember feeling like I didn’t belong anywhere; like I had missed out on something so significant I could never get it back. At the time I thought it was about not knowing my biological father but later realised, it was more about not growing up with my tribe; with my Indian culture.

I remember one night I was in a bar in Kings Cross after finishing work, drinking a ‘long island iced tea’ like it was a glass of water, when I asked myself ‘I wonder how long I will live if I keep living like this?’ One thing led to another and within two days I had moved back home.

Nothing much had changed for the following year. And then the most amazing thing happened – I met an incredible loving man. His name is Harry and he gave me something I had never had before. Here was a man who was a giver instead of a taker.

Very soon after we met we fell pregnant with our first born, Jordan. He was a blessing to us both, but more so to me. I believe that he was the catalyst in me committing to creating a family; a Tribe of my own although, I had no idea how challenging it would become.

Becoming a wife and mother brought a world of self realisation that would propel me on a long and challenging journey. I had no idea how scary and healing it would be. It was a voyage that took a very, very long time.

My twenties were about having children, renovating the house, my husband and I getting to know each other and surviving the newness of having a family. We were so young and had no preparation. I believe my strength at the time was my strong desire to create a tribe for myself and to make sure that I did it in a way that would be loving, forgiving and enjoyable.

Church became a part of our life in our twenties. Looking back, I think it had more to do with needing to be part of something bigger, rather than the actual church. That was evident by the rejection we experienced years later when we matured in our faith, questioned the ‘status quo’ and eventually left; to be ostracised as if we were lepers.

For most of my 30’s I battled with depression. It gripped me intently and wouldn’t let me go. I was suicidal at times, even to the point of having planned precisely how I would do it. The only thing that stopped me was knowing I would be letting down my tribe. I couldn’t face my children growing up with the same pain and loss I had.

After years of living with depression, going to countless healing retreats and drinking myself into oblivion night after night, I finally decided to find my biological father.

Due to my strong research skills and the information that my mother had given me about the family, within a week I had found a 1st cousin of mine who lived in Melbourne. I later found out it was our grandmother’s dying wish to find my brother, so my cousin had been looking for us for almost 10 years. She died six months before I found them.

I discovered that I am the first born of 72 grandchildren. I also learned that my father remarried and had a son; my brother. He treated them the same so she had to gather up her courage and leave just as my mother had. He then spiralled further into his alcohol abuse until he disappeared, never to be heard from again.

We went to Sydney to meet my brother, his wife and children and his mother. The emotion that was shared over that week was so overwhelming that I can’t begin to put it into words. The most profound thing that I recall was that for the first time in my life, I looked into their face and saw myself.

My son who was 7 at the time said it faultlessly ‘Mummy, you were a brown kid growing up in a white world and now you’re a brown picture on a brown piece of paper’. Wow! What comes out of the mouth of babes?

I was well received by my Indian family. Welcomed, loved, cried over, rejoiced with and hugged like I have never been hugged before. They too had been looking for me for many years. My brother’s mother went to the town I was born twice in the hope of finding her son’s two siblings. You can imagine the joy in their face when I found them. It was like they had found their long lost daughter. It was miraculous.

It’s a strange thing, discovering family that you have not grown up with. The initial stage of re-uniting was very romantic. There were lost dreams realized and loved ones discovered. And then reality set in.

After the self discovery process occurred, I had to figure out what they now meant in my life. Who are these people really? I looked like them, had the same biology, but I was nothing like them. With my Indian family I was white and with my white family I was brown. Once again, I didn’t feel like I belonged. 

The catalyst for change in my life was the realisation that the pain of staying the same was stronger then the pain of changing. I began to ask myself better questions. I realised that if I kept looking behind, that’s where I was going to stay. So I laid down my weapons; my weapons of depression, anger, resentment, blame and the constant need to be liked and began to replace them with self belief, self confidence, gratitude and forgiveness. I laid down my ‘meds’ and decided for the first time in my life that if I kept doing what I’d always done, I was going to keep getting what I’d always got.

My journey led me to NLP and coaching and through a constant desire over the years to help the wounded, nurture the lost and hug the lonely, I realised that I had an innate gift of healing and understanding. Coaching initially was my ‘last hope’ of personal redemption. It not only assisted me in healing my pain but also put me on a course that created ‘The Red Tent Woman’.

The biggest thing I have learned in my travels thus far is that I have everything that I need within me right now. I don’t need to look externally for it. It’s not hidden in a pill, a gospel or a quote. It’s here, right in this perfectly created being. I wasn’t fashioned with imperfections; I created them myself. I am actually a masterpiece that from time to time needs some touch ups. All I have to do is find the Michelangelo in me and those touch ups are brushed right back into place.

We live in a world that is so dissociated. Our families are spread across towns, other cities and even countries. We are raising our children alone without the guidance of our elder women. We are stepping into life long relationships, often to fill a void of loneliness. We are cracking under the pressures of family and existence. Our relationships are falling apart and we are right back where we started.

‘The Red Tent Woman’ is a tribe; the tribe of women that many of us have lost in our life. They are women who can support one another in their personal and professional journeys. They are women who will be there for one another when they are challenged, lonely or just need a hand. They are women who won’t judge or criticize one another. They are women who will be there to support each other through all stages of life – from relationships to childbirth to menopause. They are women who are just like you, living their lives in pursuit of something more for themselves and their families.

What I finally realised is that I already have my tribe. It might not be as big as the one I could have had, or as colourful as they are, but they are my tribe. And what makes a tribe is the people who love you. The one’s who are there on a constant, daily basis. It’s not the blood; it’s everything else. Thanks Mum and Dad, for giving me the beautiful contrast of colour that makes up my tribe and thanks to my biological family that gave me the colour in my life that I can now enjoy.

Author: Ludwina Dautovic – founder of The Red Tent Woman